


no rest for the wicked

by fyxxen



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-15
Updated: 2014-09-15
Packaged: 2018-02-17 13:57:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2312066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fyxxen/pseuds/fyxxen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is the story about a banshee and a wolf who never had a chance.</p><p>"my heart's a racin, let's go chase her down<br/>I've been lookin for an excuse<br/>to get our of this town"<br/>- hearts racing by the bones of JR Jones</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> many many thanks as always to redweathertiger who has seen approximately three bergillion versions of this story and kept reading even as I cackled at her aching heart for these girls.

The weeks after Lydia is finally clued in about werewolves feels like a deceitful lull in the middle of a storm. Every morning, she wakes up and pokes at the still tender, healing bite. She tries to ignore the twinge in her side every time one of the werewolves side eyes her at school. She ignores the way Stiles falls back into his overeager patterns of near-stalking.

Her and Scott acknowledge each other’s existences as they pass in the halls. Her and Erica (sometimes Isaac, even, but rarely Boyd) exchange verbal barbs before class; their classmates scatter like mice before oncoming birds of prey— the girls are birds of a feather, dangerous, even if they have different markings.

Jackson still sits with her at lunch, but their silences are stilted. Not in the way they used to be, jockeying for the upper hand of the day, but in a way that runs deeper. They don’t talk about how Jackson disappears at night instead of staying curled around her underneath the covers. They don’t talk about the vacant look in his eyes.

It inspires Lydia to wear more leather, less gauzy fabrics. Bloodier reds. She feels like she’s gearing up for war.

\--

Ignoring Stiles wasn’t difficult. It was reflex. She shuts doors on his face, hands, feet; does anything and everything to ignore any sign of his very existence. Texts and calls from Allison go unanswered, voicemails are deleted as soon as she hears, “Lyds, please just listen-“

She’s not interested in assuaging their guilt. It’s easy to shut them out, too.  
Until Jackson leaves. Runs.  
Then she sends a single text, “fine.”

Twenty minutes later, a beat-up blue jeep shows up to the Martin estate. Lydia opens the front door as soon as Stiles steps onto the front steps. She doesn’t bother to greet him, instead turning towards the kitchen, knowing that he’ll follow. The ‘click’ of the door being eased shut confirms this.

The thing about Lydia Martin is that she clearly uses her appearance as a weapon. She may not have had the knowledge of werewolves or the training of an Argent, but with heels sharp as daggers and lipstick that could make a man’s heart stop at twenty paces, she controls any situation.

The day she texts Stiles, though, she looks… different. She can feel his gaze heavy on her already tired shoulders as they walk to the kitchen. 

“I didn’t text you because I forgive you,” she tosses over her shoulder while taking a turn down a coolly lit hallway towards the kitchen, ”just so we’re clear.”

Stiles has his mouth halfway open, surely to make some kind of sarcastic retort as she wheels around, the light from the kitchen giving her an eerie halo. Her finger is in his face and she has a murderous look on her own.

“It’s a really shitty thing you did Stiles. You, Ali, Scott… Who else even knows? Creatures of the night, not even out of high school! Jackson left, and you know what? I can’t even make myself care right now,” she scoffs, “just one more person who _left_."

“You tell everyone how much you love me, about your fucking ten year plan, but don’t even have the decency to tell me how much of a lie I’ve been living. Jackson left, and I don’t know if I even blame him but now I’m here and I know this big and terrible thing and I can’t do anything about it,” she pauses, expression turning cold. 

“So you know what?” She looks murderous, very much so like she could strike him down solely with the power of every brain cell she’s never admitted to having.

“You have a lot of shit to do to make things right. To make this up to me if you ever want a semblance of peace or anything that resembles civility between us. Tell Ali, hell, tell the fucking  
 _pack_."  
\--  
“What. The holy hell. Is that?” Scott and Stiles turn around at Lydia’s question, their jaws dropping at what they see.

From the attempted camouflage of muted greys and baggy sweats to sex on a stick swagger rarely seen at a high school outside of an MTV show, Erica Reyes is strutting through the cafeteria like an entirely different woman. The smile on her face is anything but nice, and Lydia is glad she’s not a werewolf. The stench of fearful lust must be rolling off half the students in the cafeteria who are frozen watching what she’ll do next.

Lydia stifles the urge to rolls her eyes when Erica licks her blood red lips before taking a large bite of an equally red apple– an act that should be, in no way as sexual as it was.

Erica winks at her before turning away, and Lydia can’t help but wonder if the cheetah print bra peeking out of the top of her tank top matches the panties. She guiltily snaps out of the thoughts when she sees Allison coming her way.

\--  
Allison, Lydia, and Stiles start to get together after school more often. They go through the Argent Bestiary, bringing Lydia in on the research on whatever creepy crawlies could be headed their way on any given unlucky day, using her language skills to translate passages of various archaic texts. The pack stays away from “team human” meetings, as the first time Erica and Isaac stopped by to get an update from Stiles, they found themselves threatened by the possibility of Lydia finding new uses for the wolfsbane pepper spray she had been experimenting with.

Isaac didn’t seem too surprised while Erica just let her claws slip out with a blood-red smirk. Lydia wants to wipe the taunt off Erica’s face, but she’s also distracted by how Erica’s French manicure disappears when her claws come out. She wonders if it comes back when the claws disappear.

Allison and Stiles tiptoe around Lydia, letting her sharp barbs and caustic attitude go unchecked for weeks, until one day, Stiles breaks.

“You know what, Lydia? I know you’re angry, I know you’re hurt, but you’re not letting us make anything better! Yeah, we should have brought you in earlier, yeah it sucks for you that Jackson left and is now all American Werewolf in London, but we’re doing our best to make things right and you’re- you’re not giving us even an inch to work with. We’re trying to be your friends, Lydia.”

Allison and Lydia stare silently at Stiles across the kitchen table. His cheeks are quickly turning pink and while his posture is defiant and angry, his gaze is sheepish as he grabs his keys and jacket to make a quick exit.

Lydia, who had turned pale during Stiles’ outburst, regains her color and after examining her nails (bare, as they had been for weeks), finally looks up to meet Allison’s questioning gaze.

\--

She invests in a good pair of running shoes. Notices a sale on summer shoes in the boutique next door, and lingers in front of the heels before sighing and heading to the side wall where the flats and other sandals are kept.

When the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end, her shoulders stiffen. She tries to relax and look casual as she looks over her shoulder— she just wants to know who walked into the store and is paying her so much attention— until she hears a husky laugh.

Something dark curls in her gut as she turns around. Erica is looking at the heels Lydia had just bypassed and is apparently flirting with the clerk _(Kerry? Caitlin?)_ , who Lydia had brushed off when she first entered the store. Erica apparently needs more help than Lydia, though, as she has the clerk apparently enthralled. 

She catches herself cataloguing everything she can about Erica from where she’s hidden behind a rack of boots on sale. Plum lips match the plum pumps she’s asking the clerk about. Her smile is the least smirk-like as Lydia’s ever seen.

Lydia decides sensible summer shoes can wait another day as she slinks out of the store. The feeling of being watched lingers until she slips into a coffee shop down the street.

\--

School ends in early June, letting summer sweep in with a warm, dry breeze. Lydia doesn’t exactly trust Stiles and Allison yet, but “Team Human” actually seems like more of a team these days. She’s still angry, but working on forgiveness. Resentment doesn’t seem to hang over them like a cloud any more. There aren’t awkward silences threatening at every turn. It’s a tentative truce, but it’s progress.

Allison and Lydia start going on runs through the preserve (not much talking is required), which Stiles and Lydia practice on focus, on drawing protective circles of mountain ash (it’s all about concentration, like they’re in their own little worlds). By the time the 4th of July rolls around, Lydia is dragging both Allison and Stiles to go shopping, bowling, anything that Beacon Hills can offer in its smattering of strangely varied activities for such a small town.

They’re at the mall just before the 4th, preparing for the barbecue being hosted at the old Hale place. Or rather, on the Hale property. Derek has yet to do anything with the house, but in between him instituting weekly pack activities and Stiles trying to integrate Allison and Lydia more fully into the pack, a barbecue seemed appropriate.

Lydia Martin backs down from no challenge, so she drags Allison and Stiles to the mall— armor comes in all shapes and sizes and sometimes it’s about looks that could kill.

Though she stops trying to tower over people with heels, or match their height, chunky heels change to boots or sturdy flats, straps, hints of concealed weapons and human trickery. She doesn’t think about her armor changing to challenge wolves. Doesn’t think of any blondes— not one who ran off to London, not one who did a 360 from camouflage to poison candy armor. 

She just focuses on shopping. Bringing Allison and Stiles almost feels like letting them see more into her world, even if they don’t understand fully why or what she’s doing.

She’s slightly regretting her decision when Stiles grabs yet another plaid shirt to try on, just about forcing her hand into tackling him in the middle of Macy’s,

“Stilinski! I know you have better taste than this. I saw you at prom. You’ve proved yourself one too many times to fool me into thinking that you’re actually going for another plaid shirt,” her words nearly drip with venom.

Stiles guffaws while being manhandled by Lydia to a less plaid section of the store while Allison pretends not to know either of them when a worried salesperson keeps glancing over.

Lydia pinches Stiles’ cheek, “come on babe, what happened to being the gay friend, hmm?”

Allison snorts when Stiles slaps his face into his palms, groaning. He groans again (why are all my friends assholes?) when she dimples, “Those is glass houses shouldn’t throw stones, Lydia.”

Fighting through a blush, Lydia raises a perfectly sculpted eyebrow, “Allison, you say that as if you don’t live right next door to us— one name for you: Isaac.”

Stiles, in all his grace, can do nothing but drop the clothing he had been carrying to the fitting room while his face turns a brighter red. Allison is bent over, struggling to breathe through her laughter.

Once the laughter subsides, they agree not to talk about it anymore. At least where they could be overheard by human or supernatural ears alike.


	2. Chapter 2

Stiles fits into the pack. It doesn't really make sense to Lydia, but for a non-supernatural being, he moves in their world well. Allison too, even if her, Scott, and Isaac have unresolved tension (sexual and otherwise). Lydia, though, just feels uncomfortable. Constantly. Peter is thankfully rarely around, presumably travelling between other packs to gather general research and/or make alliances, but being the only human in the pack without a werewolf counterpart, or at least some werewolf connection is… awkward. 

Running into Erica with increasing frequency to exchange backhanded compliments doesn’t count. It’s not on purpose, and she would never let even a werewolf lie detector have a chance to tell her she enjoyed it.

She brings up feeling disconnected to Allison one morning between their running and training sessions. The training sessions had started after Lydia decided that even if she could make a killer Molotov, even with her nastily accurate aim, she should really pick up some extra tricks if she’s to be in such a wolf- and otherwise-infested town.

Allison eyes her, a calculating look on her face as they catch their breaths, “You know, I’ve been meaning to bring this up with you anyways. As well as our training sessions are going, training with a human is really different than what we’re facing with each new ‘Big Bad,’” she scrunches her nose at the use of Stiles’ term for various supernatural creatures, “What about talking to Derek about training with the pack? I mean, not only will it give you a chance to practice more realistically, but think about maybe… well… the bonding possibilities?”

She chuckles at Lydia’s murderous look, “oooor at a minimum, it would be a satisfying sense of revenge each time you beat them?”

\--

Derek and Lydia training together was the actual worst idea.

She could trust Derek – even if only because of the knowledge that Allison would destroy him if need be. Derek wasn’t trying to kill her, he was just attacking her to make her stronger, let her practice. Still, as soon as his eyes flashed red, something inside Lydia cracked. Her world closed in and she was back in the middle of that fucking football field, screaming for Jackson with Peter’s teeth cutting off everything.

She’s gasping and Derek is looking at her with worry (pity?), almost reaching out to reassure her, when she recedes even more into herself. He flinches at the same time she does, his hand quickly returning to his side.

“This obviously isn’t going to work. One of the betas will have to help you,” he won’t meet her eyes, a put-upon gruffness she’s starting to notice more and more often lacing his voice.

Lydia is catching her breath and trying to think of a snappy retort when Derek quirks an eyebrow at her scowl, “You have an issue trusting Hales, Lydia.”

“You’re an asshole of alpha.”

“We all have our own flaws,” he turns to walk off, “have fun figuring out Erica’s.”

Lydia slumps onto her back in the middle of the clearing they had found in the preserve. Actual worst. Absolutely the worst.

\--

Lydia and Erica training together is akin to throwing a torch into a shed of full maybe-slightly-damp-but-probably-not fireworks and sitting back to see what happens.

It’s clear that neither of them really want to be there. Lydia doesn’t want to feel vulnerable. She would also like to feel like part of the pack, but is unwilling to say as much. Erica… Lydia has no idea why Erica actually showed up. She spends most of their time “training” by taunting Lydia, or treating her like prey.

They get little done, until Lydia gets tired of Erica’s taunts _(nutjob. Fuck you, oversexed asshole. Not all of us can be so prim, princess)._  
Lydia sets up the clearing they designated as their meeting place with a number of weapons. Erica is nearly decapitated, the red line on her neck as jarring as the terror visible in her eyes. That look doesn’t look right on someone wearing painted on leather. Lydia feels shaken and doesn’t know why she cares as much as she does. She proved her point, didn’t she? They avoid each other for a week or so, not once even running into each other in town.

They both tell each other it’s a relief to be able to go about their errands without running into a sassy, devastatingly gorgeous girl who could rip someone apart with their words.

Slowly but surely, they manage to set-up ground rules for insults. It’s not an explicit negotiation, but by watching each other closer than before, it does happen. Looking for a tightening around the eyes or the shoulders, they never talk about it but they armor themselves the same way. They’re night and day, but it’s clear to each of them what it means. The negotiation for training sessions are clearer– they meet on Lydia’s roof on a night of the waning crescent moon, making training far easier.

When Lydia actually scratches Erica with a throwing dagger, it heals instantly. But Erica feels a suspicious tight knot at the bottom of her stomach. Pride.

She covers it up with snark, calling Lydia some sort of coward, or maybe just lazy, but it’s clear she’s distracted because both of them know she could do better. She keeps on going though, “Why didn’t you go for the heart? Haven’t I taught you anything?”

Lydia rolls her eyes, “Well there’s a shortage of perfect breasts in the world.”

The smirk falls off Erica’s face into something gentler, Lydia feels her heartbeat quicken at the appearance of dimples, “Did you just quote _The Princess Bride_  
Bride at me?”

“Is that really what you’re gonna focus on, loba?”

Electrified silence. It feels like the calm before the storm except what’s between them feels nothing like calm. Lydia refuses to drop her gaze, even as Erica’s eyes flash gold.

Erica thinks that she’s never seen the color brown shine in the sun like that, before remembering to regain face with a near-feral grin, “You’d have to try harder than that anyways, princess,” though the nickname has none of the acidity that it used to.

They return to sparring, but the electricity between them doesn’t leave. It’s just pushed to the back of their minds for the moment, to be continued. Holds continue longer than they really need to. Erica finds flecks of Lydia’s nail polish in her hair and on her clothes. Lydia pauses before she showers, finding a smear of Erica’s signature red lipstick, or glitter from bronzer she doesn’t use.

To be continued doesn’t end up offering itself up on a specific enough timetable, and Lydia grows tired of Erica seeming to avoid her everywhere except training sessions.

She recreates her Molotov trap… to a less lethal extent.

While practicing evasive maneuvers, Lydia exploits Erica’s tendency to get lost in playful sparring, and sets up a series of paint bombs, which splatter the blonde in a rainbow of hues. Lydia expected to feel superior and maybe a little haughty, but seeing her wolf (she ignores the possessive feeling she’s started to feel when thinking about Erica) bathed in color and looking perplexed sends her into a fit of laughter.

It gets her tackled with a growl, Erica looking torn between amusement, pride, and frustration.

Her heart is racing in her chest, but most of that has nothing to do with fear, “You have me where I want me, now what are you going to do with me?”

Erica is off her so quickly it’s surprising she didn’t get vertigo. Her face is crimson and it has nothing to do with the paint that covers her from head to toe.

Lydia’s heart takes ages to return to normal.

\--

Derek notices Erica watching Lydia more closely after they start training together regularly. It wasn’t a removed or dispassionate gaze. It wasn’t hateful. It was a little confused, and more than that, hungry. He doesn’t worry about it too much, only mentioning it to Stiles who waved it off quickly enough as Erica being a sore loser after the initial explosive incident.

But Derek bringing it up makes Stiles start to watch Lydia more closely.

He corners her at a team human night, trying to get her to talk about Erica. When straight up asking her doesn’t work, he reverts to the annoying best friend image he’s been building up, crowing over not being “the gay friend” any longer.

Allison and Lydia double-team him with a quick pillow, one to each side of his head, accompanied with a surprisingly childish “duh.”

Lydia refuses to come up with a seduction plan with them, threatening instead to retrieve her beat-up copy of _The Notebook_ if they don’t drop it.

They watch _Young Frankenstein_ instead and make plans to go shopping for weapons. Allison and Lydia also mean it as a makeover day.

Never underestimate the danger of a well-prepared femme.


	3. Chapter 3

Allison ends up flaking on their plans after Lydia had already gotten to the mall where they had agreed to meet. She decides to get her nails done without Allison, in the end. Just because Allison wanted to give Scott another chance doesn’t mean both of them have to be deprived of a little pampering. Her nails are black with sunbursts of gold that seem to explode at the edges with dark purple, a taunt of aconite.

Erica, Boyd, and Derek are surprisingly spotted shopping for linens. The domesticity amuses Lydia. Her and Erica make eye contact right before Erica tells them to continue on without her, some excuse for a training exercise. Practice evaluating threats, or something. If anyone were to ask her, she would have no idea what she supplied moments before. So no one believes her, but it seems so important for her to believe it herself that the boys don’t push it and leave her to be with Lydia.

They walk along, bumping shoulders every so often. They don’t say anything, but after their third circuit of the mall, Erica loops her left pinky around Lydia’s right, and pulls her into a movie store. They browse through the DVDs and don’t say anything about how nervous but buoyant Erica looks, nothing about the faint blush on Lydia’s face.

\--  
Scott calls dibs on one of their movie nights, and they watch a number of movies in Spanish, which is delightful mainly for the running commentary him and Erica keep up.

During a break, Stiles, Scott, and Erica are talking about Día de los Muertos, “No Scotty, I totally get it! I just wish there were some cool movies out there about día de los muertos,” Stiles stumbles over the accents.

Scott shrugs, “Me too, but I don’t really trust Hollywood not to fuck it up. It’s not a joke, you know, and it’s so close to Halloween that a ton of non-Mexicans don’t get it. They think it’s just more skulls and ~oooh spooky~.”

“It was always really important to mi abuela that we made the altar together and got the ofrendas ready as a family. You have to have all four elements represented, and the uh… what are they called… marigolds? To attract the souls of the dead. My parents never believed, so I’m the only one that makes the altars now that abuela is gone,” Erica finishes with a slight blush on her face, when she realizes how intently Lydia is watching her.

Scott and Stiles continue talking about what Scott and Melissa to do celebrate, ignoring Lydia’s quickly increasing heartbeat, for which she’s thankful. Erica hears Derek sit next to Stiles, whispering I told you so, but couldn’t care for the life of her what it’s about because Lydia is still looking at her.

Lydia is about to ask Erica to tell her more, or just keep talking about the colors of Día de los Muertos, or anything she wants because she looked so happy at that moment, but Allison and Boyd make a noisy reentrance to the living room with popcorn. The moment is broken, but Lydia notices Erica moving closer to her, presumably to get to the popcorn more easily. Their thighs stay pressed together for the rest of the night.  
\--

In the middle of August, Lydia leaves her window open. It’s been hot, but nothing compared to the unbearable electricity during her training sessions with Erica.

Her foresight is rewarded when a curvy blonde tumbles through her open window.

If Lydia had been under the covers, she would have thrown them back and invited Erica to join her, but as it were the heat made it so that she spent most nights on top of the covers, tossing and turning. Instead, she pats the bed next to her, waiting for Erica to crawl up and join her.

She’s not sure if werewolves can smell arousal, but the way that Erica crawls over her, leaving their lips mere inches apart, it wouldn’t surprise her. Their kiss starts off frantic and almost too-rough, but as the night wears on they melt more and more into one another. It doesn’t even matter how sloppy or inexperienced they both clearly are, they leisurely explore each other’s bodies.

Even with werewolf stamina, they fall asleep tangled with one another, exhausted and happy. They don’t really talk about it during the daylight, but for the rest of August, Lydia makes sure to leave her windows open at night.

\--

On one of the last days of August, Lydia wakes up distinctly much less happy than she was when she had fallen asleep. She wakes up alone, breeze from the open window dancing across her bare skin.

There’s a note tucked under the pillow that had, at one point, been under a certain blonde.

“princesa, I’m sorry. Especially after this. I probably shouldn’t have come but this month was- I just couldn’t leave-“

Lydia’s fists clench involuntarily, threatening to rip the note Erica had left. Why would she leave? Why would she start whatever they had and then leave? Taking a deep but clearly not calming enough breath, Lydia continues to read,

“Boyd thinks there’s too much trouble here. I can’t let him go off on his own. He’s blood, even if he’s not exactly. He’s my brother. I’ll be back soon, I hope. Xoxo, Loba.”

She wants to laugh. She chokes out a sob instead. Fucking Erica Reyes.  
So Erica and Boyd have run away. Lydia is furious.

She sharpens her nails to talons and paints them blood red. She drunk dials Stiles one night, but he doesn’t answer. She must have left a rambling voicemail because he keeps calling her. Sends a few worried texts, which she ignores until she has a… feeling that she can no longer ignore. A sinking feeling.

Stiles says she needs to come by the loft.

Erica is dead.

Boyd turns up a few days later. The only person whose eyes he meets is Lydia.


	4. Chapter 4

School starts up again. The summer heat refuses to let go of Beacon Hills.

Lydia skips the first week.

Stiles visits her. Allison tries to visit her. The first few times, she won’t meet their eyes, a blank stare fixed on her blank bedroom wall. Blank nails. Everything is painfully blank. Allison has appearances to keep up with her family and doesn’t come around often. She looks guilty when she does show up.

Everything is so empty. Stiles holds her hands, doesn’t try to fix thinks with talk. Quite honestly he’s not sure if she could hear him if he did.

Boyd is murdered, and Lydia can’t stop the scream that bubbles out of her throat. She’s at the nail parlor, getting her nails done in navy and silver— colors for the depth of the ocean and the lining of dreams. Before, color symbolism seemed like a fun in-joke. Now it just felt like a way to stay afloat. Lydia excuses the scream on a hangnail, but the women look like they’ve seen death. When Stiles stops by her house that night to tell her about Boyd… They find everything they can on banshees, wailing women, and death portents. Lydia pours over the research instead of pretending to care about her coursework.

They set up a semi-normal research schedule, almost back to normal. Stiles can’t help but burst in after another week, nudging her with a mixture of tenderness and exasperation, “Come on, princess. You need to come back to school. Let’s get you armored up.”

She resents him a little for using the nickname she had come to think of as only Erica’s to use.

He helps her paint her nails, but she doesn’t comment on how careful he is about it, doesn’t want to think about where he could have learned it. One night when they were trading drunken secrets, he talked about Claudia Stilinski as if she were a goddess, how he tried to help her stay looking flawless and alive even as her body turned against her.

Stiles helps Lydia put together an outfit: black for mourning, yellow-gold for sunlight and remembrance. For soft hair that’s permanently taking a dirtbath, six feet-deep, wrapped in the purple and running free, unbound from the moon.

It’s painful, the resurgence of whispers of nutjob princess, but it subsides quickly enough this time. Halloween party planning takes over the minds of Beacon Hills High and Lydia fades into the pack during school hours.

\--  
On Día de los Muertos, she brings marigolds to Erica’s grave, remembering the calaveras that danced on her dresser, remembering the few times she talked about her blood family at pack movie nights.

_“You clean the graves and leave ofrendas. The marigolds are meant to attract the souls of the dead to the offerings. You gotta make sure they have something bright to come back to, so they can rest and feel your love before leaving again.”_

Lydia makes a rough altar at Erica’s grave. It’s not the best, but she couldn’t really stand to have the pack around her for this, and the articles she read online didn’t really talk about werewolf traditions for death. She figures her being a banshee makes her enough of an expert. Or the best she’s going to get.

_“It’s a way to show that you’re still connected, that you won’t forget them. That they’re still there for you.”_

At one point after the sun sets, Lydia turns and Erica is standing right next to her, dressed in clothing Lydia had never seen her wearing before– a traditional wrap skirt and an off-the-shoulders embroidered shirt. Erica looks down at herself and laughs, gesturing at the traditional clothing as if to say, well, here’s what my blood has given me. She looks ethereal. Lydia doesn’t question how they’re together, it’s just so damn good to see Erica laughing.

_“Come on, princesa, let’s let the dead have their fun.”_

Lydia jerks awake with no one next to her, clutching her phone in a death-grip. Unlocking the screen, she sees it’s just past midnight, and there’s a picture of Erica, hair in intricate braids, mid-laughter. Not wanting to go home, she falls asleep on the grave of a girl she could have loved. Probably did love. Definitely loved. She dreams of running naked through the woods with a blonde wolf and howling, feral, at an unbroken moon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _“Come back! Even as a shadow,_  
>  even as a dream.”  
> – Megara, Herkales by Euripides, trans. Anne Carson


End file.
